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About Joyce Clark

Contact information for Councilmember Joyce Clark
Home: 623-772-9795
Cell: 602-320-3422
Office: 623-930-2249
Please call between the hours of 9 AM - 5 PM
Email:
clarkjv@aol.com
jclark@glendaleaz.com
Joyce Clark is a 49 year resident of Glendale. She has a BA in History and Education and graduated from the College of Notre Dame of Maryland. Her past careers include teacher of high school history, small business ownership of a book store, a professional ceramist and was the founder of a retail craft gallery. Joyce and her husband, Charles, have three children and seven grandchildren.

Joyce was first elected as your Yucca district Councilmember in 1992 and served Glendale and the Yucca district from 1992 to 1996. Joyce took a four year break from public service when her mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s to personally care for her. In 2000 she successfully ran again for Yucca district councilmember as a write in candidate against the incumbent. She is the only candidate in Arizona to achieve a write in victory over an incumbent. She was your voice for the Yucca district for 16 years.

Joyce retired in December, 2012, and as a private citizen Joyce did many of the things she never had the time to pursue. Two of those are the tender care and feeding of her koi pond and blog writing on issues in Glendale, Arizona.

In March of 2016, Joyce announced that she would leave retirement and run for the Yucca district council seat in Glendale. Once again Joyce defeated an incumbent and on December 13, 2016 she took office as the Yucca district councilmember for another four year term, ending in December of 2020.

Joyce is the only elected official in the State of Arizona to have defeated an incumbent as a write-in candidate and then to defeat a second, different incumbent as a candidate.

Glendale is not the only city to deal with financial woes related to hosting a hockey team. Newark, NJ and the NJ Devils have been at it for years. The Prudential Center opened in 2007 and is the home of the Devils. The Associated Press reported on February 26, 2013 that Newark and the Devils had finally reached resolution through the use of an arbiter, “Last year an arbitrator ruled the city owed the Devils $2.7 million a year in parking revenue plus other considerations that totaled more than $15 million. That was roughly what the Devils owed the team in back rent, fees and other expenses. The team hadn’t paid rent since 2007 while the parking dispute dragged on.” The acrimony was so bad that “Mayor Cory Booker called Devils chairman Jeff Vanderbeek a “Grade-A huckster” and accused him of reneging on promises made to the city.”

Nassau Colesium

Another case in point comes from Newsday Mobile in a March 2, 2013, article entitled, Nassau says Islanders/SMG owe millions in unpaid rent, utilities, fees by Randi F. Marshall. It states, “The New York Islanders and Nassau Coliseum’s management company, SMG, owe Nassau County as much as $3.8 million in unpaid rent, utilities and other expenses for the Coliseum dating back to at least 2011, records show.” Revenues received by the Islanders have declined since 2010. In 2012, Islanders owner Charles Wang announced that the team will move to the new Barclay’s Center in Brooklyn when the lease with Nassau County expires in 2015.

The financial tribulations of Newark and the Devils and the Islanders and Nassau County are a far cry from happenings in Glendale. It has, however, opened a window allowing the public to see exactly what financial arrangements were made in both of those cases.

Are there other cities and/or governmental entities that pay to keep their hockey teams or any sports venues? You bet there are. Information available is spotty at best because of the propriety nature of the information. But it is known that the City of Bridgestone pays the Nashville Predators $8.8 M annually. In return the team pays rent of $200,000 annually. In 2008, the Hornets received $5.3M from New Orleans. The team in turn, pays 60% of concession revenue received as annual rent. How much is that? We don’t know because it is proprietary.

So, what’s the point? It demonstrates that there are all kinds of arrangements between governmental entities and sports teams and in almost every case; it is to the benefit of the sports team. Many of the arrangements are not known because they are not available for public scrutiny. Glendale has been one of the most transparent entities to offer every element of any proposed deal to its citizens.

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3 Comments

“Hockey Town” (Detroit) is another example. The Red Wings haven’t been paying their rent nor the share of cable revenue owed the city and are now extracting big bucks from the beleaguered city under threat of moving to the ‘burbs.